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For Le Grand Fooding, a Frontman Follows Directions

Chad Batka for The New York TimesLCD Soundsystem has given its farewell concert, but James Murphy, above, performed at the French culinary event Le Grand Fooding.

What do you do after you “retire” at 41 from a popular and influential rock band?

If you’re James Murphy, frontman of the indie dance act LCD Soundsystem, you dabble.

Since the group’s farewell show at Madison Square Garden in April, Mr. Murphy has done some music producing, some video appearances, some D.J.-ing, even some industrial design. On Saturday night he added line cooking to his list of professional hobbies.

“More, more, more,” he told a colleague, as they plated an elegant beef and chive salad. The dish was the creation of Inaki Aizpitarte, chef of Le Chateaubriand in Paris, and it was part of Le Grand Fooding, the offbeat French festival of culinary arts. For its opening event, the organizers threw an open-air party, billed as a “campfire session,” in the Elizabeth Street Garden in NoLIta; as night fell, guests wandered from station to station, getting little plates or cocktails mixed by Sasha Petraske, of Milk & Honey, and Richard Boccato, of Dutch Kills. D.J.’s spun MIA and Talking Heads, and in a gently lit grotto, the musicians Hanni El Khatib and Sondre Lerche played to an audience picnicking around sculpture. It was all very downtown-refined.

The chef Dante Gonzales, of Dante Fried Chicken in Los Angeles, had the longest lines, for his “sock-it-to-me fried chicken” and “warning tastes like chicken tofu,” accompanied by biscuits and a black-eyed pea salad.

But Mr. Murphy was also a star attraction; gushing fans snapped photos as he worked.

“His line is a little longer than ours,” noted Wylie Dufresne, the WD-50 chef, as he doled out root beer-glazed ribs with the help of the doppelganger D.J.’s Andrew and Andrew. No hard feelings; Mr. Dufresne added that Mr. Murphy moved like “a natural” on the line.

In a white apron over his customary white shirt, Mr. Murphy plated with this bare hands, occasionally pausing to sample the goods. He had helped Mr. Aizpitarte prep the day before, juicing lemons and cutting chives, and also got a lesson in butchering. In his retirement, he said, he has the freedom to pursue short-term projects like Le Grand Fooding — “a week of thinking and a couple nights of work.”

“I find it fun,” he added. “I like to eat. It’s an opportunity to throw something back in the well that I go to all the time.”

But Mr. Murphy said he knew better than to make any culinary suggestions. “My job is to do what I’m told,” he said, before turning his attention to a hungry guest with a question.

“It’s a slightly burnt butter that has bits in it,” he said, explaining the beurre noisette salad dressing. The next diner asked him for an explication of the songs on “This Is Happening,” LCD Soundsystem’s last album. He demurred. In some ways Mr. Murphy brought a bit of downtown rock ‘n’ roll to the party, or maybe just a bit more downtown chefdom.